


Definitely Not Good

by Sheeana



Category: Young Avengers
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:52:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sheeana/pseuds/Sheeana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billy hurts himself. Teddy is not (very) amused. A couple days in the lives of a couple superheroes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Definitely Not Good

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fio](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fio/gifts).



> This sort of veers away from canon as if Children's Crusade didn't happen and the original Young Avengers stayed a team together. Happy Yuletide!

Not good. Definitely not good. Very definitely not good.

In fact, Billy was fairly certain this ranked in the top ten things that had ever happened to him that were classified as "not good." Maybe even top five. Every time he tried to push the beam that had fallen on him off his leg, he heard his bones cracking a little bit more. Not good.

Using his magic to try to slow his fall only worked when he wasn't disoriented from being thrown off a rooftop. At least he wasn't dead. Somewhere above where he'd landed in the alley, back on one of the rooftops, he could hear Tommy shouting at someone, so that, at least, was good. He turned his attention to his own problems, since he probably wouldn't be much help to the rest of the team. First, he tried moving his leg, just a little bit.

"Ow," he said, voice wavering. He couldn't raise it high enough to shout for someone to help. Another thing that wasn't good. He decided he had to try to pull himself out from under the beam. He put both his hands on the wet asphalt beneath him, and tried to lift himself up enough to get some leverage.

He blacked out for a few seconds. Maybe a few minutes. 

"Billy!"

When he looked up, disoriented, a blurry green face was staring down at him. For most people, probably, that would be a problem of some kind. Most people didn't have boyfriends who could shapeshift into giant green people.

"Hi, Teddy," he said. His tongue felt too thick in his mouth. He frowned.

"What are you- Billy!" Teddy's hand was on his shoulder, gently shaking him. Billy shook his head and sat up, and then he remembered: he hurt his leg, and he had a beam on top of him. 

"Get it off me?" The pain was so sharp his eyes were watering now.

Without wasting a second, Teddy bent down and lifted the beam off Billy's leg. Most people didn't have boyfriends with super strength either, and right now Billy was immensely grateful that he did. But he wished he hadn't been watching, because seeing the look of panic that suddenly appeared on Teddy's face was a lot worse than feeling the pain shooting up his leg.

"This is bad," Teddy said, his eyes looking wildly back and forth as he tried to figure out what to do. He was so distracted that he shrank back to his normal, blond self, and that scared Billy a little bit more than he wanted to admit.

Billy sat up fully. Not a good idea. Teddy's hand was hovering over the break, now, and when Billy glanced down at it he gulped.

Oh. _Oh._ His leg wasn't how it was supposed to be at all, unless his leg was supposed to look like that. The pain was so sharp it was making his head hurt now too, as if in sympathy for his leg. He tried to haul himself up against the cement ledge on the side of the building. The movement jarred his leg; he had to bite down hard on his lower lip so he wouldn't shout out. 

"Can you heal it?" Teddy was asking, sounding more desperate and frantic than Billy could remember him ever sounding before. (Except, maybe, the handful of times he'd thought Billy was dead. Those had been worse on a scale of incomparable magnitude.)

"Oh. Right." Something clicked inside his brain. Oh yeah. _Wiccan_. His power was magic. He could heal people. Apparently he wasn't thinking straight. Pain could do that, he thought. He took a deep breath and held his hand over his knee. 

"IwantitohealIwantittohealIwantittoheal," he said, prayed, _begged_. For a tense moment, he wasn't sure it was going to work.

"Billy-"

They both let out an audible sigh of relief as his hand began to glow blue and his bones reset themselves into place. The nauseating, electric pain began to subside. "That's good," he heard himself muttering. There was still blood all over his costume, but he'd prefer bloody clothing to his leg being broken anytime.

"He's okay?" Kate was asking, somewhere behind Teddy.

"Yeah," Teddy said, straightening once he saw that Billy wasn't in any imminent danger. "Broke his leg, but he fixed it up himself."

"You need help getting him home?"

"I'm fine," Billy called out, as he struggled to get to his feet. The cold sweat covering his body didn't make much sense now that he was physically unharmed. Putting weight on his leg still felt like a terrible idea, but he forced himself to work past the anxiety and test it. Sometimes his magic didn't work as well as he hoped it would. This time, though, he grinned as he balanced his weight across both his feet. His bones were intact.

When he looked up, Teddy was large and green again. He slipped one arm behind Billy's knees and knocked him off his feet, and then they were flying. 

"I really don't need this," Billy muttered under his breath.

"I really don't care," Teddy replied evenly. Billy got the sense this was happening not because he needed to be carried anywhere, but because Teddy didn't want him wandering off and having a beam fall on him again. Fair enough, he decided.

-

"You feeling better?" Teddy asked, once Billy was changed back into normal clothes and lying on the bed in Teddy's bedroom. If only someone hadn't decided today was a good day to terrorize a residential neighborhood, maybe they could have spent the day playing video games and eating potato chips and kissing and pretending they didn't have real-life things to do. Probably not all at the same time.

"I was fine before we left," he replied, sheepish.

"Your leg bone was in the wrong place."

"Real technical."

"I'm a shapeshifter, not a doctor."

"Ha."

"I'm serious, Billy. You could've died." Teddy _did_ have a very serious expression on his face when he came to sit on the edge of the bed, with a wet washcloth in his hand to wipe the blood off Billy's knee. It was cold, but it was also nice to not have his own blood all over his skin, and Teddy's hand was gentle. 

"We do this kind of stuff all the time. You didn't complain when I broke my finger, or when I got a concussion, or-"

"I did complain when you got a concussion."

"Well, I don't remember."

"That's because you were so out of it you couldn't remember who the founding members of the Avengers were."

"Yeah, right." Billy rolled his eyes. Teddy shifted beside him and wrapped an arm around him, and Billy gave into the urge to lean against him even if they were still arguing.

"You said that Wolverine was probably on the original team."

"I did not. You're making that up."

"Would I make something like that up?"

"Yes. You would."

At some point, bickering became kissing. Kissing was generally a lot better than bickering, so Billy wasn't complaining. He reached over to seize Teddy's shirt, which wasn't strictly necessary, but he liked the way it made Teddy respond by wrapping his arms around Billy's waist.

It wasn't that it was the first time they'd kissed each other like this, because they had definitely done this before. Billy just couldn't stop being giddy every time it happened. The fact that another person wanted to kiss him and be this close to him was still a little startling. The fact that this person was Teddy Altman was just the icing on the cake that was Billy's life. He wasn't very good at metaphors when he was kissing someone, it turned out.

After awhile, Billy closed his eyes, tired. Using his power took something out of him, and healing was more difficult than most things. He had to get it right, or he might end up explaining to someone why their arm was attached to their head. Or something - he'd never actually tested what would happen if he got it that wrong.

While Teddy was distracted with getting them both under the blankets, he took the opportunity to practically burrow into the soft black material of Teddy's shirt. 

"I kind of want to kiss you every night," he said.

"I kind of love you," Teddy said right back, and his lips touched the top of Billy's head.

Okay. That was new. Not bad, though. Definitely not bad. Very definitely not bad. He turned his head and kissed Teddy's shoulder through the fabric.

They were quiet for awhile after that. Teddy's fingers stroked idly through his hair, making him drowsy. Sleeping next to Teddy was one of the best things Billy could imagine. It was like his favorite flavor of ice cream and his favorite Avengers comics and his favorite movies all rolled into a single package. He wasn't lying when he said he wanted to kiss him every day. Maybe next time they could do it without any broken bones beforehand, though. He loved being a Young Avenger, but he wasn't eager to repeat that experience. At least Teddy had been there to help.

"Best boyfriend ever," he mumbled into Teddy's shirt, unsolicited.

"You got a lot to compare me to?"

"Don't need to." That was the funny thing. He'd never, ever doubted that Teddy was in this for the long haul. Maybe it was a fact that after you and your boyfriend became superheroes with secret identities and joined a team together, you were stuck together. Or maybe it was all the times Teddy had held the bucket while he puked after using way, way too much magic. Either way, he didn't need to date someone else to figure out that this was the best possible way his life so far could have gone. 

"Go to sleep, Kaplan."

"Right back at you, Altman."

-

"Oh, great," Tommy said, taking an exaggerated and visible breath and then letting it out as Billy pulled himself up onto the raised platform in the training area they still used for sparring practice a few times a week. Billy had just finished a set of knocking down targets with precisely-aimed lightning bolts, and he was feeling pretty pleased with himself until he saw Tommy.

"Oh great what?" he asked wearily.

"You made out with him again."

"I got - what is _wrong_ with you?" Billy could only stare at him with horror on his face.

"Lots of things," Tommy said casually.

"I'll agree with that," Kate muttered, as she strung an arrow to her bow. Beside her, Cassie was smiling, trying not to laugh, and Eli seemed to be trying to ignore them all completely. Billy just wanted to hide.

Tommy hopped back and forth on his feet, warming up to run. "Not my fault he has that dumb look on his face."

"I'm related to you," Billy said with disgust, in realization.

"Says you. I never said I believe any of that crap."

Luck appeared to be on Tommy's side, because before Billy could answer, Teddy walked over and slipped his hand into Billy's. Not very many things had such an instantaneous calming effect on Billy's temper. "Hey. You free later?"

"... You know when I'm free."

"Yeah, but I'm trying to ask you out. Help me out here."

"Oh. Right. Okay. Yeah, I'm free later." He glanced at Tommy, who was hiding his mouth behind his hand and snickering. Suddenly, he didn't have any desire to stay here and finish training. "In fact, you know what? We're done _right now._ "

 _Again?_ Teddy mouthed to Kate, as Billy grabbed his wrist and marched them both off the training court.

-

"You could always zap him into a toad or something," Almost every time Teddy said the word "zap," ever since he'd found out about Billy's magical powers, he accompanied the word with the same hand gesture.

"Technically, he's my brother," Billy said. He took a vengeful bite of his lime-flavored ice cream.

"I'm not sure technically is the right word for that."

"You're right. Technically, he's the reincarnated version of my previous self's brother."

"Because that makes so much more sense." Teddy reached across the table and snatched Billy's spoon out of his hand to eat the ice cream Billy had almost gotten into his mouth. When he was finished, he thrust the spoon business-end down back into the scoop of ice cream in Billy's bowl.

"About as much sense as being the half-Kree, half-Skrull-"

"Okay, okay. You win," Teddy said, laughing and spreading his hands out in defeat. "Your origin story is slightly more sane than mine."

"Slightly being the key word."

"Yeah."

This time it was Billy's turn to steal Teddy's spoon. He remembered that he hated coffee-flavored ice cream just _after_ he put it into his mouth. Whoops. Teddy raised his eyebrows while he made a face and swallowed.

"So," he said, after three large spoonfuls of lime to wash away the last traces of coffee, "Which of us has the craziest family reunion?"

"I don't know," Teddy said thoughtfully. "I mean, I guess mine would end in an actual war."

"If Tommy's my brother, that makes Magneto my grandfather."

"... Good point."

They ate their ice cream in silence for awhile after that, while they thought about it. Billy vaguely remembered a time in his life when questions like this didn't ever come up. He would go to school, get beaten up, come home, eat dinner with his parents and his little brothers, and go to bed. No magic, no superpowers, no family trees the size of Manhattan. He used to be normal.

"This stuff's complicated," he complained.

"I thought you like complicated."

"I like being part of something bigger than me. You know. Helping people. Saving the world sometimes." _Way to go, Billy, making it serious again_ , he thought.

"Those aren't complicated. Those are just good."

"Flattery won't get you anywhere with me, Altman."

"Got me into your-"

"If you finish that sentence, I'm going to zap you." He made Teddy's new favorite gesture right back at him. Teddy laughed, and Billy had that awful fuzzy feeling in his stomach he used to get around Teddy all the time, before they started dating. He tried to drown it with more ice cream.

-

"Or you could just _turn into_ the President-" Billy was saying. They were rounding the corner from the building they used for training sessions. Two days after shattering what felt like half the bones in his leg, and he was as good as new. Sometimes it paid to be a mutant. Especially one with magical powers.

"Yeah, but it'd be easier if you just did a spell or something," Teddy said. This wasn't the first time they'd had a debate like this, but it was the first time they'd had this one in particular.

"I'm not saying it _wouldn't_ be, but for the sake of argument, let's say I'm not there."

"Why am I there if you're not?"

"I... got kidnapped. By the aliens."

"Are the aliens Kree or Skrull? Maybe I use my influence to get you back."

"Nope. They're totally different aliens."

"Well, I'm not helping the President, then. I'm going after you."

"I'm on a spaceship. In space."

"Look, Kaplan, I don't care where you are. I'm going there, and your ass is coming back with me. You don't get to get out of saving the Earth duty just because you got kidnapped."

The deafening sound of an explosion interrupted Billy before he could answer.

"... You hear that?" Teddy said, eyes widening.

"You think anyone within ten miles of here _didn't_ hear that?" Billy winced and rubbed his ear with the palm of his hand. Whatever it was, it didn't sound good at all. Good thing they had training and experience in dealing with this kind of thing. "Guess we better get going?"

Teddy had that grin on his face - the one that meant they were about to do something awesome together. "You sure you're ready for this, Wiccan?"

The blue glow that enveloped them both and lifted them off the ground was Billy's answer.


End file.
